Religion and Violence in the Fall of Soeharto and Transition to Democracy : 1997-2004

by Joko Wicoyo
I think the book titled Beginning to Remember pictures Indonesia's turbulent decades of cultural repression and renewal amid the rise and fall of Suharto's New Order regime. These cross-disciplinary pieces illuminate Indonesia's current efforts to reexamine and understand its past in order to shape new civic and cultural arrangements.
In 1998, the beginning of reformation era in Indonesia brought a wave of relief and euphoria. The fall of Suharto in 1998 opened a proliferation of studies on different aspects of memory and history. It allows space for people whose voices had been muted opened the floodgates to all manner of commentaries, newspaper accounts, and conference and seminar papers. This atmosphere which is well known called “reformation era” indicates the spirited efforts to remember, interrogate and rewrite the past which Suharto did not dispel persistent corruption, official secrecy and denial, religious and ethnic violence, and security policies leading to tragedy in East Timor, Aceh, and other regions in Indonesia. But the reformation opened up new possibilities for seeing the past by presenting a surge of discourse that challenged officially codified national history in mass media and publishing in public policy debate, in the arts, and in popular mobilization and politics.
This book edited by Mary Zurbuchen consists of 15 articles written by Indonesian and foreign scholars, artists and poets as well as writers presents the descriptions and exploration of some of the expressions, narratives, and interpretations of the past found in Indonesia today. The authors illustrate ways in which the dissolution of the Indonesian state's monopoly on history is now permitting new national, local, and individual accounts and representations of the past to emerge. This book covers fields from performing arts and literature to anthropology, history, and transitional justice.
Beginning with Ki Tristuti Rachmadi’s powerful autobiographical account of his sufferings under the New Order (‘My Life as a Shadow Master Under Suharto’), the volume immediately goes further to Degung Santikarma’s ‘Monument, Document and Mass Grave: The Politics of Representing Violence in Bali’, a gripping narrative that includes a story of an individual whose painful memory of the 1965 killings is suppressed by the protocol of power relations in contemporary Indonesia.
Another chapter is a personal memoir by one of Java's famous shadow-play masters, Tristuti Rachmadi, for years imprisoned under the New Order, and finally this volume comes to a close with an article by historian Anthony Reid commemorates the national struggle at the regional level, while South African lawyer Paul van Zyl compares efforts in transitional justice in Indonesia, East Timor, and South Africa.
For me, this book written by many outstanding experts in arts, politics, history and sociology reminds my memory to what happened since the fall of Suharto when I was in the first year to pursue my master degree in political sciences. What are expressed in this book refresh my mind towards some events which I missed from my perception. All papers presented in this book really enrich my intellectual achieves with a suitable balance between depth, breadth, and unity amidst such an enormous diversity of views and approaches. I‘m sure this book is really interesting to read and without having doubt I propose not only to Indonesian students, but also to any students who are interested in Southeast Asian studies to read this book.
Readings : Zurbuchen, Mary S. (ed). Beginning to Remember.